Really disheartening. At least it makes the horrible interface change make sense along with what seems like new code all over the place. Plex went from never having a single hiccup for me over the course of, maybe 7 years… to now being incredibly unreliable and spotty. My Roku apps crash, the server bogs down, libraries don’t show up properly across iOS apps, roku apps, Android apps. They’re obviously making huge changes in the backend of the software to allow for more stringent DRM to attract content partners and as the article states, plan to embed premium content suggestions amongst our own local media. This… is very very bad news.
Libraries show up fine on iOS and Android, what issues are you having?
This again will be able to be disabled just as the tidal, news, pod casts and web shows can be…
Keeping it optional is obviously best, but the article mentions possibilities that could be exciting.
I’ve spent a lot of time ripping our movies and TV shows so that there in Plex. We’re also cordcutters and use Plex for live TV and DVR.
If we could eventually rent a movie to watch right in Plex, that would be awesome. Other than some other streaming services, we pretty much would never have to leave the Plex app.
Yeah, exactly. People who have already paid don’t matter to them, and people who have never paid matter even less. This is purely a money grab at the expense of the product itself.
Mine have been flaky as all hell. I’ll restart Plex media server, restart my media server computer (a headless mac mini) etc. and it doesn’t seem to fix. Then wait a few hours, magically fixed. NEVER had these issues before the interface update (again, I think it’s safe to assume there’s some serious back end changes going on to make way for stricter DRM in order to strike content partners).
Does anyone remember Boxee and the D-link produced Boxee Box? Boxee was a killer platform when Plex was in it’s infancy. Boxee Box was such a great piece of hardware for it’s time but ultimately, Boxee realized they couldn’t make enough money just being great at indexing local content and started trying to partner with “premium” content before soon afterwards just going belly up and abandoning their entire platform. REALLY hope this isn’t where Plex is headed.
As we’ve all noted countless times, the new UI is just an outrageous step backwards from the old one. The ONLY reason it makes sense for this new UI to have been forced onto all its users is to make way for the imminent rollout of this new “premium” content being sprinkled in throughout our indexed local content. There’s a flow chart in a conference room somewhere in San Jose that I know Plex has been using to sketch out how to integrate this content into their users libraries with this new UI and they’re taking these plans and selling content partners on how many eyes will be on their movies / trailers / shows to push subscriptions or ad-based media plays. Think of Plex like Facebook etc. - it all starts with this amazing free platform. No one is really sure where the revenue is going to come from but wow it sure is useful and well designed. Bam, insert ads in your feeds, games and other “premium content”. It’s essentially where Plex is pointing the ship. I’m not upset for them wanting to become more profitable, I’m upset that the core value of Plex (amazing indexer of your local content) is going to be so quickly eroded. The last thing I need in this world is yet ANOTHER place to get premium content". Literally every device I use Plex on (Roku, Pixel, iPhones, iPads, Apple TV) is already better at this.
I don’t think so. From my work with DRM previously I would assume the DRM is going to be STRICTLY in the client and will have ZERO to do with your local Plex Server.
If you think about this it makes sense. All the present new content like podcasts, news, webshows, tidal do NOT go through your server but are streamed from a backend. This makes certification MUCH easier as the whole chain is accounted for. With the server and the transcoder there is just far to many layers that could never pass cert.
I know if it me doing this dev work, only the client would know about DRM. And of course the delivery servers they maintain if any. Keep in mind this content could be streamed directly from whomever they partner with directly to the Plex client with nothing in the middle.
The Boxee Box was awesome for it’s time. There was nothing like it at the time. It could play anything. Fully supported DNLA, etc. I still play with one from time to time and use Emby to cast to it via DLNA. Still handles H.264 and Mpeg2 video quite well.
It got ruined with “external content” and when they started bricking boxes that rolled back firmware to get away from the external content. Talk about shooting yourself in the foot. People purchased it for the hardware and UI for local media and wanted nothing else from it. Heck back then Internet was sh*t for most people and you couldn’t stream well anyway.
You probably remember the WD Live boxes too I bet which a lot of people moved to after Boxee Box since it was very similar in playback ability just not as nice a UI.
You sound a lot like me and just horde your old equipment.
This morning I was looking for a cable and went through a box I haven’t opened it at least 7 years. It was full of old Hauppauge capture cards and analog tuners I used to use with Beyond TV and Sage TV. Maybe 15 of them.
Stupid thing is I’ve moved 4 times since I used them and keep moving all this “useless” stuff from house to house.
I was actually looking for MIDI cables and power cords for some Roland Synths that are 30 years old I was going to sell. The Juno 106s and Jupiter 8s are worth more now then when I purchased them 30 years ago. Guess sometimes it does pay to horde stuff.
Then how do you explain the radically new UI, that I think is a clear and evident step backwards in usability and appearance, coupled with the new UI also seeming to be way more shaky technically? It’s all too coincidental.
Look, I know it’s unpopular among many, but I actually really enjoy the new interface – others have mentioned so as well. So, let’s remember that its likability is subjective.
I think the new UI is fine as well, but could be better with some tweeking.
the real issue is how unstable it can be, based on my experience with the PS4 app. It crashes more than it should, they should be fixing these issues and other tweeks (how about view options in the apps to match what’s on a windows PC? having a film role scroll in a collection view seems counter intuitive. Why can I not add collection tags to photo folders/groups? Things like that.) instead of adding even more content that isn’t really in line with how most of their user base use/need PLEX for. I have many options to stream NETFLIX or something, but PLEX is my best option for local hosted content.
I agree, there are definitely some issues. I’m having a few over on the Roku end of things as well.
I think it might be time for Plex to stop trying to support every client device under the sun. Pick the major players and roll with that. Fewer devices to support would hopefully add more stability across the remaining devices and accelerate feature roll outs.
